Blah Blah Flowers

Johann Hari gets it spot on: If we care about the BBC, we must fight to defend it.

Labels: BBC, David Cameron, media, News International, Rupert Murdoch

The Daily Mail, buoyed by it's success in surfing a wave of ignorant public opinion against the BBC has a new scandal, a paedophile working at the Beeb in the children's department!

Except, he was in four episodes of a childrens show made by an independent company in 2001. Of course, the comments are worse, as though people reading this article thought it was saying that Auntie had replaced Songs of Praise with film of BBC presenters wanking over a pile of toddlers.

Talking of masturbation, they must have surely run out of Vaseline and tissues at Associated Newspapers over a survey that allows them to claim that most people want to scrap the license fee. Of course they do, in a survey format people are never going to say "I want to spend ten pound a month paying for something" because most people are fundamentally idiots bereft of village walls to fall off of. However, seeing as ITV is no more than a rolling channel of Coronation Street, Heartbeat and, on digital, Inspector Morse repeats, there is a very good reason why making Auntie rely on adverts to pay its way is no solution at all.

Labels: BBC, Daily Mail, License Fee, stupidity

Apparently the BBC are currently running a Celeb Strictly Come Dancing, which just shows you how little attention I pay to Saturday Night Telly if there's no Doctor Who on. Apparently most of the black contestants have been voted off week after week despite performing better (what this judgement is based on isn't explained, so is possibly just an imaginary score in the journo's head used to justify the story) than white contestants who have continued on.

So, it's the public votes that decide who gets kicked off the show. So why does the News of the World act as though it's the BBC's fault and encourage it's readers to contact the BBC to complain that the show is racist? They point out that the black contestants have often done well with the show judges, so surely it's the Great British Public that are at fault here, not Aunty?

Oh wait, News of the World... The Sun... News International... Rupert Murdoch... hates the BBC... silly me, now it all makes perfect sense. Next up, how the BBC caused our rubbish summer.

Labels: BBC, News International, racism, Rupert Murdoch

It's not new by any means but sitting in a cinema this afternoon I realised how much I enjoyed the Radio 1 advert, even if I don't really listen to the station any more.

Labels: BBC, radio, Radio 1, YouTube

Previously.

Stephen Green, sole creator of the unpopular soap opera consisting purely of charmless bigots Christian Voice, let's us know how things are going for him at the moment:

BBC GO FOR POUND OF FLESH OVER SPRINGER COSTS.

So, that suggestion that they should pay for his decision to take them to court didn't work then?

The BBC have just sent a bailiff to serve a statutory demand on Christian activist Stephen Green in respect of Mark Thompson's costs of £55,000 in the Jerry Springer the Opera case.

The demand could see Green made bankrupt and homeless.

The High Court ruled last December that Stephen Green could not prosecute Mark Thompson, the Director General of the BBC, and Jonathan Thoday of Avalon over the BBC2 broadcast of Jerry Springer the Opera and its subsequent theatre tour. The Court ordered costs against him.

Mark Thompson and Jonathan Thoday were awarded costs totalling £90,000 against Green, who is the National Director of the prayer and lobby group Christian Voice. The BBC's solicitors were awarded £55,000 and Olswangs Solicitors, who acted for Thoday, got an order for £35,000.

Still, there is a bright-side:

The costs order is better than it could have been; the BBC originally demanded almost £78,000 after instructing David Pannick QC, probably the most expensive barrister they could find, while Thoday wanted over £58,000.

Last month, Stephen Green wrote to both Mark Thompson and Jonathan Thoday inviting them to waive their costs in the interests of goodwill and justice. The appeal to the better nature of Thompson has fallen on deaf ears.

Funny that. It's almost as though they were angry at having their reputations, and that of the businesses they worked for, being impugned by one hubristic runner-up from a Master lookalike contest.

It should be enough for Mark Thompson and Jonathan Thoday that they got away with blasphemy, insulting God and the Lord Jesus Christ, at least in this life. For these rich, powerful men to pursue me into the bankruptcy courts over money I don't have would be vindictive.'

Both sets of solicitors have also threatened to chase the donors who gave the money for the original action, but it is far from clear that a court would allow that. Even if it did, Green is adamant that he will protect the donors' identity, even if that puts him in contempt of court.

'I should go to prison rather than reveal their names, even if I could remember who they were,' he told both Thompson and Thoday.

Labels: BBC, Christian Voice, Fundamentalists- Christian, Jerry Springer The Opera, Stephen Green

Daily Mail insist Doctor Who fans are OUTRAGED!!!1! that phone number in show doesn't connect to anything exciting.

Doctor Who finished its latest series on Saturday night watched by a huge audience of nearly 10million. But it was another set of figures that got some fans really worked up - the Time Lord's phone number. The digits had been flashed up on screen several times in the previous week's episode as the Doctor's sidekicks Sarah Jane Smith, Martha Jones and the Torchwood team contacted him.

More than 2,500 fans... dialled it before the last episode aired on Saturday.

One fan complained: "They showed that number so many times, as if they were asking for it to be called."

But their attempts to contact their hero on his personal number - 07700 900461 - came to nothing when they discovered that it would not connect-Writing on the BBC's website, one disgruntled viewer said: "Grrr - I phoned the Doctor's phone number but there was just an annoying network message.

"What's the point in showing a phone number if you're not gonna use it?!"

The Daily Mail really will try to find any excuse to bash the BBC won't they? Just imagine the headlines if they'd used a real number, 'Lorry driver Pete Belly claims that the BBC have made his life a misery after using his mobile phone number in an episode of Doctor Who'. Also, 2500 fans out of ten million, isn't that below one percent of the people who watched it supposedly tried phoning it?

Labels: BBC, Daily Mail, Doctor Who

Warning: Contains Hitler.

Genius.

Labels: BBC, Doctor Who, Torchwood, YouTube

The BBC decide to stop being overzealous in their attack on a woman for creating knitting patterns for Doctor Who aliens.

Labels: BBC, Doctor Who, lawyers

BBC Lawyers are threatening legal action to Doctor Who fan who created free knitting patterns for some of it's aliens, including the Ood and the Adipose, despite having no intention to release knitting patterns or woollen Doctor Who figures themselves. Crikey, I hope they don't come after my Mother for the Superted she made me when I was four.

Labels: BBC, Doctor Who, lawyers

BBC Radio One are not going to be playing 'Fairytale of New York' by The Pogues this Christmas time because of it's use of the word 'faggot', not because it's a really annoying song. Maybe if the line was changed to call him 'gay' instead that would be okay.

Labels: BBC, gay, homophobia, Radio 1

Update on the Christian Voice in court story from last month, the charmless bigots have lost their case, The Times reports judges at the High Court ruled that the Theatres Act 1968 prevents any prosecution for blasphemy over public performances of plays, and the Broadcasting Act 1990 prevents any prosecution in relation to broadcasts while Beeb DG Mark Thompson writes in the Telegraph, the first comment on which is from someone called David who says Let's be honest - the BBC is and has been since about the 1930s a socialist/communist front organisation. Unless one is from the ghastly Guardian degenerates then do not apply for a job. It is thus hardly surprising that the disgusting BBC puts out filth and blasphemous programmes. However it is worrying that the legal profession is also tainted with the same sort of hatred of all that is decent in what is left of England. I'm surprised he didn't manage to fit a slam on gays in there too. Anyway, Stephen Green has already said on the Bigot's website that he will be appealing this decision.

I have heard the line that Jerry Springer the Opera was a satire on intrusive and exploitative TV before. The BBC are repeating it in a somewhat self-serving press release this morning.

Are you there pot? It's me, kettle.

Labels: BBC, Christian Voice, courts, Fundamentalists- Christian, Jerry Springer The Opera, Stephen Green

Doctor Who's pioneering first producer has died. Telegraph obituary.

Labels: BBC, Doctor Who, Television, women

Labels: BBC, Doctor Who, Flickr, humour

Every sketch show has someone playing teenagers, Kevin and Perry, 'Brilliant!', Vicky Pollard, Lauren. The Armstrong and Miller show, poached from Channel 4 to BBC1 after a long time in the wilderness appearing in not-very-good TV shows and not-very-good adverts (Pimms O'Clock? Monkey!), approaches it differently.

Labels: BBC, comedy, YouTube

Isn't British policing wonderful? Isn't foreign policing awful? Wouldn't things just be better for everyone if British police officers policed the planet?

It would seem that nothing else happened over the weekend. Yes BBC News 24, I'm looking at you. Blanket coverage of the McCann's driving to the airport, then repeated ad nauseam until the plane they were on touched down in the UK, then that was rolled around until they returned home to the village they live in, now that's swarming with reporters with no news to report.

There's been talk over the last weeks of how the BBC should cut back on it's digital channels so that minority interest shows like The Today Programme on Radio 4 aren't axed. Now, as far as I'm aware Today is only listened to by politicians, newspaper columnists who need inspiration to fulminate against the world and retired early risers in the counties. It's The Archers for Westminster folk, of practically no use to anyone else. Still, I'd be quite happy to sacrifice BBC3 to keeping it open, if it could be sealed in concrete, along with the casts of Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps and TittyBangBang , and dumped in the North Sea, then that is something to be applauded. But hands off BBC4 which, with a few exceptions, is like Radio 4 only people pay attention to it. News24, I still don't understand why our money is wasted on this. If you watch News24 then you realise very quickly that, just because something newsworthy could happen any time, that does not mean that news is happening any time. Or rather, there is lots of news going on that the BBC don't bother covering. It increasingly seems that when anything happens outside of Washington then the BBC turn over coverage to ABC. I can't remember Western Africa cropping up in the news since Mark Thatcher and a load of ex-Eton pupils decided to try and take a country over for a laugh. Those little Russian or ex-Russian states round the edge of the old U.S.S.R. don't get a look in (is there still a civil war going on in Chechnya? I watch News24, so I don't know). And China? Supposedly Murdoch dropped the BBC from a satellite TV package he wanted to flog to the Chinese people, I don't know why because they only ever get mentioned in the financial news.

So yes, let's shut down News 24 and BBC3, and give the money to John Humphrys for his pointless little show.

Labels: BBC, Madeleine McCann, media, news, police

So David Cameron was on Newsnight last night. He didn't do too badly, it was sad that on the immigration issue not one of the four interviewers questioned his claim that immigration had been 'too high', but then Newsnight regularly does episodes which claim more or less the same thing, so I suppose that's not surprising. I did like the fact that he allowed himself to be cornered by his use of New Labour and Old Tory rhetoric on families; non-traditional families were fine, but families consisting of one man and one woman were best for children, which is not to say they were any better than families which did not conform to that model, most liberal in his attempts not to cause offense... He didn't think the Tory proposal to give married hetero parents £20 more in their weekly benefits to help them bring up kids would encourage loads of partners to get married, and I think he dodged out of answering why, if the Tories thought two hetero parent families were better why they were proposing giving them money rather than single parent families.

But he desperately needs lessons in appearing less like Tony Blair. That's his biggest drawback at the moment. Well, that or the fact his policies are rubbish.

Man in a Shed is not happy though and is drawing circles on video captures to try and prove a dastardly plan by the BBC to turn David Cameron purple. Maybe they should have slipped him some of this stuff before the show?

Labels: BBC, Conservatives, David Cameron, Newsnight

Sherrif Paxman lays down the law about television, 'trust' and why Tony Blair is an arse and an idiot. I may not like Paxman as an interviewer but he has some good points here. Unsurprisingly the Daily Mail has decided to interpret this as a blistering attack on Auntie, but then as they've spent the last few weeks obsessed by newsreaders legs I think anything they have to say about the Beeb can be safely ignored.

Labels: BBC, Daily Mail, Jeremy Paxman, Tony Blair

Three episodes in to Sanjeev Bhaskar's journey round India and they haven't as yet, sullied things with any Indian music, preferring British artists like The Chemical Brothers, Boards of Canada, the Beatles. You would have thought that India produces some music, surely? According to the BBC, this would appear to be not the case.

Labels: BBC, India, music

"Oh God, we've got to put up with an hour of Julie Bindel's rationalisations for her transphobia based on unreconstructed Seventies seperatist-lesbian-feminism? Can I club myself into unconsciousness with the DSM-IV first?"
"Cheer up, there's four of us, one of her, we're supposed to be mean, Evan Davis is over there, just think of it as 'Dragons Den' with better lighting."

Labels: BBC, Flickr, Julie Bindel, Radio 4, transgenderism, transphobia

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to ignore the petition to repeal the hunting act 2004.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to urge the BBC not to use DRM or propriety formats, but to instead use free formats.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Ban the use of private 4x4 vehicles in urban environments.

Labels: BBC, environment, fox hunting, petitions